A downloadable game

Set in a virtual computer world that humanity migrated to after the destruction of Earth, a young man wakes up in a small cave. He has no idea who he is or why he is there. Play as Rodrik, a young man with a small gem which contains strange power, Maggie, a young lady who is sick of living in the conditions of her town, and Gavin, a smart young man who is determined  to uncover a dark secret about the truth about their world. These three kids' stories are connected somehow. And as a dark shadow looms over their world, they must figure out who the enemy is and how to defeat it. This is not a normal enemy. Defeating it is simply impossible to do. At least for a normal person...

The Mountain is an RPG game by Studio 403. It is inspired by the Mother/Earthbound series. It is still in a very early development stage. A short demo for the game is available to play in your browser by clicking the "Run Game" button.

KEY BINDINGS:

Z: A Button
X: B Button
Arrow Keys: D-PAD
Enter: Start
Left Shift: Select

Download

Download
The Mountain Demo (Analogue Pocket) 512 kB
Download
The Mountain Demo (Nintendo Gameboy Color) 512 kB
Download
The Mountain Demo Setup (Windows 32 Bit) 71 MB
Download
The Mountain Demo Setup (Windows 64 Bit) 76 MB
Download
The Mountain Demo (Nintendo 3DS) 6 MB

Install instructions

We currently have builds for Windows 32 and 64 bit, Gameboy Color, Nintendo 3DS, and Analogue Pocket. To install, download the file and install it for your system. You can also play the game in your browser by clicking the "Run Game" button above.

Development log

Comments

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really hope that you continue development on this! i tried it on my 3ds and it was a lot of fun!

Game Tested and here are my thoughts;

-I like what you did with the "Launcher" pretty neat concept, reminded me of an RPG maker game called One Shot

-Though it was a neat concept, I had a bit of "sussy" feeling as I read the launcher, you might wanna change your phrasing there, so people won't hesitate in "clicking the power button on the PC"

-On that note, can you tell me how you did the "launcher" and the web version of the game?

-On the title screen, the cursor can still move after pressing the confirm button so the scene changes depending on the highlighted part of the options. Like if I pick "New Game" but quickly move the cursor to "Erase Data" the scene will change to erasing date scene rather than the new game. You might wanna stop the movement of the cursor after you press the confirm button.

-I like how the transition on the first enemy turns to "battle" its neat, I wished it was consistent. I suggest removing the random encounters all together and have all enemies present on screen so the FIRST ENEMY ENCOUNTER that was memorable sticks with the mechanics to the rest of the game.

-On that topic, the random encounter rate feels like too high and music should change to a battle theme to engage players into the fight.

-Enemies seem to have ridiculous amount of health, reduce it. For the first levels of the game make sure the player isn't immediately overwhelmed with "OP-ness".

-Even after dying in battles the player can still shoot, you may want that remove as to avoid game breaking bugs later on.

-On the topic of battles, Have a dedicated "dodge" button or "escape" option so players can have a chance if they're on the verge of loosing.

-You can also tweak your enemy AI so it's not just charging straight at the player. I understand if they can move diagonally, but have variety in patterns so it's NOT JUST RUN AND SHOOT.

-Screen moving, screen transitions and dialogue speeds are too slow. Increase their speed or have a button prompt to make it go faster. It's fine if you're aiming for a shorter game overall, but it'll be frustrating if it adds up as the gameplay last longer.

-Have a name tag on all NPCs at all times so player can know which character talks. It's kind of confusing trying to find which is which in the long run, trust me.

-Break the paragraphs into smaller pauses like have 2 lines of texts and have an option to "keep reading?" or something in the lines of that for longer dialogues or lore reading, so players can take a break.

-At the end of the level, where you "fall" on the water the player actor moves up? May I suggest move it up THEN down, to simulate falling? And have them falling DOWN the next scene too. [just a minor nitpick]

-SERIOUSLY THO HOW DID YOU MAKE A WINDOWS VERSION, TEACH ME.

(1 edit) (+1)

Hello! Thank you very much for the feedback! The launcher is basically another html web page. When the launch game button is clicked, it launches the web emulator. And yes a lot of aspects of the game are inspired by Oneshot! You can create a web version of the game by exporting to web in gb studio.

I'll also edit the phrasing of the launcher. It's pretty obvious what the player has to do but just in case.

I did not know about the cursor still moving after pressing the A button on the title screen and i'll be sure to get that fixed.

The battle transitions in the later part of the game is broken because i had a plugin that wasn't working correctly. But i'll try to add it back in because i contacted the developer of the plugin and i think he's fixed it now. About the random  encounters... they're not random. They're actors that hide themselves after being defeated. It's still being worked on but will be fixed hopefully in the next build. Also the graphics for that location are placeholder graphics and will be replaced with trees. 

I will also make the battle theme play during the later battles. I had not implemented it yet.

The health displayed in the window is actually in percentage. And the stop sign battle has a lot of health on purpose. It's like that so that the player can get a feel for the controls and once they do, they are able to progress onward. There's no EXP system. It's all about your real life ability to play the game. I might consider making it easier though. 

I like your idea of a dodge button. I think it would be interesting to bind it to the select button so that it's kind of hard to get to so that you're not abusing it and only use it in emergencies.

The enemy AI for the stop sign is very simple on purpose. I might slow down the movement though to make it a bit easier. The AI will change. Also, right after the prototype ends, there's supposed to be a boss battle. It will be more interesting with the enemy being able to dodge, charge, and the player being able to use SP Attacks (magic).

The screen transitions are fixed now in the latest version as well as the dialog speed. They are a bit longer during cutscenes though on purpose to give it more feeling. I might add a skip slow dialogue button though. The prototype version is only about 1/10 of the entire game. I'm aiming for at least 4 hours of gameplay. 

At one point I did use the name tag plugin for my dialogue but it was too glitchy. I might contact the developer of the plugin to see if they can fix it.

I might implement a keep listening option when the lore dialogue is optional but for dialogue that is required in cutscenes I might just paraphrase it to make it smaller.

And i will also try to make a falling effect when the player goes down into the waterway. I'm afraid it might look a little too plain but it might be possible with a platformer scene.

And it might take a little programming knowledge but I figured out how to compile for windows through this guide on GB Studio Central.

https://gbstudiocentral.com/tips/compiling-gb-studio-roms-into-standalone-execut...

Thank you very much for all your feedback! I will keep updating the developer site and if you want you can go back to check the progress!
I will also update the itch.io demo soon with all the features of the prototype but with shorter gameplay. I really appreciate all your help! And if you have questions, feel free to ask away!

- The Walking Taco